Her face burning, Lillian rolled off him and buried herself under the blankets. Gregory had no such concerns or modesty. She peeked out in time to see him throw off the blankets and stretch, before leaning toward the plates Gran held out to him.
“My goodness!” Gran gave an approving purr. “Now, I know why dryads have a preference for gargoyles.”
“Gran!” Lillian bolted upright, but kept hold of the blankets, not wanting to flash the room.
“Don’t be a prude, darling. I’m old, not dead. I still have hormones enough to appreciate a fine-looking specimen when one is presented to me.” Gran then turned her attention back to Gregory and bestowed a smile on him. “I brought breakfast for you both.”
Lillian tried another angle. “You could have just called through the door. What if we had...we’d been...”
“Having sex?” Gran started to chuckle again, belly laughs this time. “If you had, the whole house would have heard. Gregory has a tendency to roar. Besides, I didn’t hear any headboard cracking last night. And the house is still standing—no stray flares of creative Avatar magic.”
Lillian collapsed onto her pillow and tossed the sheets back over her head.
“No time to hide.” Gran tugged on the blankets. “You need to eat and then get dressed. The Fae Council arrived in the night. We need to discuss what to do about the military problem. And Gregory, dear, you need to pretend to be human. No more dragging your feet about it.”
He grunted around a mouthful of food but nodded his head.
“Good. When you are both presentable, come down to the kitchen. We have work to do.” Gran patted Lillian’s blanket-covered leg and placed a plate of food in her hand.
Lillian eyed the plate of bacon and eggs. Not exactly a romantic breakfast in bed, but she was hungry, and it would be a waste of perfectly good food if she didn’t eat it. Picking up a fork, she started to work her way through breakfast.
GREGORY STOOD BEFORE her and gave her his best annoyed gargoyle scowl. Strange how well the look transferred to his now fully human form. Another minor feat she wouldn’t mind mastering was his ability to look equally noble and stern in nothing but a pair of silky, black boxer shorts. Perhaps it had something to do with him being comfortable in nothing but his own skin.
Lillian admitted it was a little disconcerting having a nearly naked human man in her bedroom. On the one hand, she knew it was Gregory, and yet on the other, she could see very little of her guardian in this tall, dark-skinned man with his brown eyes, dark hair, and severe expression. Somehow, this felt different than when Gregory wandered around half-naked in gargoyle form. Maybe it was because her eyes kept telling her she was standing across from a stranger she’d only laid eyes on a couple of times before.
She held out a pair of black jeans, then gave them a little wiggle when he didn’t take the bait.
“Oh, come on—you’re worse than a two-year-old. They’re just jeans, not a viper about to bite you.”
He frowned at her tone but stepped forward and snatched the jeans out of her hand.
“I thought the worst thing about the Mortal Realm was its lack of magic,” he muttered as he jerked on the pants, though was cautious about doing up the zipper, “but I was wrong. There is one thing worse—its fashion. Humans wear so many layers, even their clothing has clothing. It snags, it rubs, it bites, it pinches...”
It seemed her gargoyle needed a little incentive.
Lillian stretched up and pressed a quick kiss to his lips. “If you wear the clothing today, I’ll help you out of them tonight.”
His lips parted, and his eyes widened ever so slightly. Secretly, she was pleased she could still surprise him. The kiss had the added benefit of stilling his tirade.
“I’ll play at being human—but I only do it for you.” Gregory held out his hand for the T-shirt she still held. “Though, you are welcome to kiss me whenever you want, if you think it will make me more malleable to your diabolical plans.”
A pearl of laughter escaped her. “You’re such a terrible actor—though I like your sulk. It’s cute.” And she also liked this new playful side of Gregory. Seeing him happy warmed her heart, and she wanted to do whatever was required to keep him happy.
He pretended to sulk at her words—but his expression was so off, she laughed even harder. “Enough, you great ham. We have a Fae Council to pacify and a large military problem to resolve.”
Gregory sobered and nodded.
Lillian held the door and motioned him forward, wanting to make sure he didn’t try to ditch some of the clothing on his way down. When Gregory frowned at her, she knew she had hit on the correct plan.
With a huff, he stomped past, still pulling at his T-shirt and the waist of his jeans as if trying to make them more comfortable. Halfway down the stairs, he gave up and fisted his hands at his sides.
When they reached the bottom, Lillian could hear the voices drifting from the kitchen. By the sound of it, the council meeting was already underway. Gregory shoved the kitchen door hard enough to make it groan in complaint. If there had been anyone on the other side, they’d have been laid out by the blow.
“The door is not to blame for you having to wear clothing,” Lillian stated under her breath.
Gregory stopped, turned swiftly, and smiled what could only be called a devilishly handsome grin. “Keep it up, and I’m going to revert to my true form, march over to the human military compound, and strut naked past Major Resnick. Twice. In case he misses it the first time.”
“That’s sure to stir the hornet’s nest.” A great, gruff hoot was followed by a hand slapping a thigh. “If you do, make sure to let me know in advance. I want to be there to witness it.”
Gregory grinned and nodded to the stranger. Lillian froze, her mind trying to place where she’d seen the older man before. He was familiar, but she didn’t know from where. Or why he was in Gran’s kitchen. He was dressed in faded and patched jeans, an old flannel shirt, and his feet were encased in rubber boots. Upon first glance, Lillian might have taken him as a farmer.
But she could ‘feel’ the power hidden inside him.
“The council members are using glamour to hide,” Gregory replied to her unasked question. “If you look with more than your physical eyes, you will recognize them.”
Lillian scrutinized the man. “Greenborrow?”
He gave her a courtly bow. “In the flesh, great lady.”
Gregory skirted the table and took one of the seats beside the leshii. While Lillian made her way around to sit in the other chair, she cast subtle glances at the other three people already seated.
Gran wasn’t presently in the kitchen so she couldn’t look for hints there. And while by Gregory’s easy manner, it was clear he knew everyone in the room, Lillian was still annoyed enough with him she wasn’t about to ask him for information.
Two of the occupants were women in their forties. A third was a tattooed and pierced young man with spikey black hair, a black leather jacket, and worn blue jeans. He looked to be in his early twenties—not much older than Lillian herself if she was to go by her eyes alone.
She focused on the man first, not because she was ogling his tattoos and piercings—though they were something to behold—but because she expected the sidhe lord, Whitethorn, to be at this meeting. She couldn’t imagine him not being there. Unless he was running late. She narrowed her eyes again trying to see something of the sidhe in the young man sitting at the table.
His smile was neither overly friendly nor outwardly cold, which was very much the sidhe lord’s personality. Ah, she was right. “Whitethorn?”
A regal nod greeted her question.
“Hmm, isn’t the whole idea of the glamour to blend in?”
“Yes,” Greenborrow cut in before the sidhe lord could reply. “But we make do with what humans we can take by surprise and won’t be reported as missing to the authorities. Whitethorn lost the bet and won the ‘honor’ of taking on the little drug lord’s seeming.”
“In the past, we’ve found the easiest identity to use is one already created.” Greenborrow shrugged. “It has the added benefit of sending the authorities off on a wild goose chase if we make a misstep.”
Knowing some of the fae as she did, a nasty thought occurred to Lillian. “Just curious, but what happens to the humans you impersonate?”
“We put them in a safe place where they sleep for a day or two, depending on how long we need to move around in the human world.” Greenborrow gave a little shrug. “And, no, we don’t kill them. Once they are no longer needed, we give them false memories and then allow them to wake.”
“Glad to hear it.”
“Dead bodies cause too many questions.” Greenborrow sounded mildly disappointed.
Whitethorn turned what might have been a laugh of genuine amusement into a cough.
Her eyes rolled back toward Whitethorn. At least she now knew who the tattooed personage was.
One down, two to go.
Looking over at the women, she debated for a moment. One was friendly, her cheerful grin contagious. Likely one of the sprites. But which one, mother or daughter? If Whitethorn wasn’t averse to taking a form that looked much, much younger than his years, Lillian wouldn’t put it past the mother and daughter duo to play around with their ages, either.
“Goswin?” Lillian took a stab, figuring she had a fifty-fifty chance.
The sprite nodded.
As for the other woman, she gave nothing away in her expression. Lillian frowned, a touch unhappy at failing what felt like a test.
“The banshee,” Gregory supplied, his attention still half on adjusting his clothing. He tugged at the neck of his T-shirt with a little too much force and Lillian heard the telltale popping of a seam giving way.
A huge grin lit up Gregory’s face, and he fisted the front of his T-shirt.
“Don’t you dare do an imitation of a drunken redneck at a tailgate party! T-shirts don’t grow on trees, and you already destroyed one outfit last night. Which I think is plenty for now, don’t you?”
Gregory froze, his brows furrowing in confusion.
Gran walked into the kitchen, saving Lillian from having to explain ‘redneck’ and ‘tailgate’ to her gargoyle.
“Good,” Vivian said, “you’re all here. And I see my granddaughter even got Gregory into some clothing.”
Gregory grunted something dark under his breath but didn’t verbalize further.
Gran sat down in the chair next to Lillian and nodded to Whitethorn.
The sidhe lord glanced around the table. “Most here know the problems we need to solve and solve quickly, but Lillian, you and Gregory have only just awakened and possibly haven’t had time to fully understand all the ramifications.”
Gregory sat up straighter in his chair, and Lillian found she mimicked him without conscious thought.
“We can hide from the humans to some extent,” Whitethorn continued, “but there is one time each month when we run a greater risk of exposing ourselves to them.”
Gregory leaped to the answer before Lillian even had the first stirrings of an idea. “The Wild Hunt.”
“Yes,” Whitethorn said. “We’ve been lucky until now. The power both you and Lillian raised in the last Wild Hunt sustained the boundary wards of our land and fed our people what magic we needed to survive, but it has now dwindled to a level where we must risk a Hunt or weaken to a dangerous point. And the humans are not our only enemies—the remaining Riven are still very much a threat.”
Greenborrow reached across the table and patted Lillian’s hand. “You broke the Riven’s foothold in this world, but they are far from defeated. We’ve found traces of them far north of us. They’ve retreated to the northern wilds to lick their wounds and to avoid contact with the humans. But I believe they will only stay away until they’ve grown strong. Then I fear they will return, and they might not take as much care to avoid human notice as we have. If the Riven reveal our existence to the humans, it could prove more damaging to us than any battle the Riven themselves might wage.”
Whitethorn gave an almost defeated sounding sigh. “The Wild Hunt must ride to shore up our defenses, for we will need them in the coming days and months.”
“However, we can’t risk the Hunt for the very reason it could expose us to the humans,” Gran countered, an arched eyebrow aimed in Whitethorn’s direction. “Round and round we argue and still no progress.” She stuck her spoon in her tea and gave it a good stir as a way of punctuating her statement as she continued to glower at the fae.
By the exchange of dagger-like looks shooting between Gran and Whitethorn, Lillian could only assume the Wild Hunt was a sore point between the two. Silence held for a heartbeat more, and then the entire table erupted into a chaotic debate strident enough to make a politician proud.
Lillian didn’t venture into the verbal warfare, instead studying Gregory for any reaction. He leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms, and tilted his head first at one arguing fae and then another. Not one soothing word or sage piece of advice did he utter into the debate. Instead, he studied the others with a glint in his eyes that clearly said he found the whole situation humorous.
When she raised an eyebrow in question, he merely nodded his head in a barely discernible motion. Then along a private link, he added, “If you find a peaceful resolution to allow the Wild Hunt to ride while at the same time protecting the humans from themselves, I will make certain the Clan and Coven abide by your plan.”
He was leaving it up to her?
Well, it’s settled then. She’d just have to come up with a solution to the ‘human’ problem and prove to Gregory his trust in her wasn’t misplaced.
She pursed her lips. Between the military, the media, and an army of scientists, Lillian had just set herself a near-impossible task.
How did one hold the Wild Hunt without the risk of discovery? How indeed?
The problem with the hunt centered on the initial raising of power, and the subsequent magical blast wave it pushed out across the land, which washed away all but the most powerful of pre-existing spells. The usual concealment spells the fae used to hide, and perhaps even some of Gregory’s shielding spells would be washed away by the new tide of power released across the land, exposing the fae to the humans.
Normally the risk wasn’t too high, as the Wild Hunt was held at night in relatively unpopulated areas. But with military, police, media and a host of other people roaming the forests, that presented a problem.
The fae needed to hide in plain sight. In essence, they needed to be visible and yet not draw attention to themselves. Or maybe to simply not stand out as unusual.
A diversion!
They needed to pull off a bait and switch trick worthy of a great magician.
When the bare bones of an idea came to her, she grinned so hard it hurt her cheeks.
“The Wild Hunt needs to come out of the closet to hide in plain sight.” Lillian smirked as those around the table fell silent one by one and turned toward her. When she was certain she had their full attention, she continued. “We need an ironclad cover story to offset the danger of discovery during the Hunt. Give the average human a plausible, mundane explanation for anything strange they might happen to see, and their reasoning mind will be more than willing to believe the lie instead of an impossible truth.”
Greenborrow wheezed rather loudly. Lillian took it as a sound of encouragement.
“If you want to hide the Wild Hunt, then all you need to do is throw an elaborate masquerade ball. Give the humans illusions, parlor tricks, and true magic. They won’t know truth from fiction, and the secret of your existence will remain safe. And if any of the fae are spotted, it will be easy to discredit any news stories that might arise. Most people don’t believe in monsters or aliens or magic.”
Lillian held her breath, waiting for the first denial. One minute stretched into a second, but no challenges came. She released the b
reath she’d been holding and glanced around at the other fae. Each, in turn, had a thoughtful expression, their gazes turned inward in calculation. It was Gran who finally broke the unnatural stillness by picking up her cup of tea and sipping from it.
“Well?” Gran directed the one word into the silence. “Personally, I think Lillian’s idea has merit. What says everyone else?”
Whitethorn cleared his throat. “If this masquerade is to work, it will need to be substantial to draw the numbers required, covering a large region, community-wide at least.”
“There could be more than one venue,” Goswin suggested. “A parade, or a theatrical performance, a renaissance fair. Music and dancing and drinking.”
Greenborrow laughed. “Lots of drinking. Get them drunk, and any stories will be easy to discredit.”
The banshee shifted in her chair and pulled absently at her clothing like Gregory had been doing earlier. “Will not those persons seeking the truth behind the more fanciful imaginings—such as Major Resnick—be suspicious of something like this? What possible reason could we have to host a...medieval fantasy renaissance fair?”
“Greed.” Lillian laughed at the banshee’s questioning look. “This whole situation has drawn in huge crowds of people, and those people have money in their pockets. Any business-minded local is going to be brainstorming ways to part people from their money. I bet we can get all the other local businesses on board with this as well, especially if we do the heavy lifting.”
“I really can’t find fault with your reasoning,” Greenborrow commented. “Though your plan may draw suspicions directly upon your family and the Coven by association.”
“From how Major Resnick was questioning me and by what Gregory picked from his mind, we know we are already in their crosshairs. The problem isn’t so much whether we can completely fool the authorities, but whether we can hide the Hunt from the vast majority of humans. The Hunt must happen. How many days to the next full moon?”
“Twelve,” Gran said, her brows furrowing in thought. “Twelve days to pull off the bluff of all bluffs. Leave this to me, I’ll rally the Coven. We’ll see to the human threat, and it will leave the Clan free to help Gregory to prepare for a war with the Battle Goddess’s forces.”
The Complete Gargoyle and Sorceress Boxset (Books 1-9) Page 35